‘Willy—?’ He heard his own voice try to make a question of her, although he knew she was unquestionable—although he knew, as he knew that, that she was real at last, and that everything that he Price, Anthony - For the Good of the State had had before had been an illusion. ‘Hullo, Willy.’ He wanted to keep the defeated unsteadiness out of his voice, but he couldn’t.
‘Well… this is a… a very pleasant surprise, I must say.’
‘Uh-huh?’ She moved slightly, letting the thick glossy page of her magazine spring back, brushing one perfect breast as it did so, and closing both the magazine and their friendship at the same time. ‘Is it, Tom? Is it?’
Grasping at a straw of comfort, he started to read sadness and regret into her expression. But that was a luxury he could no longer afford: he had to reject the past, as resolutely as that last log on the fire had refused to burn in the fireplace below. Henceforth he must lie on the ashes of their relationship, charred and scorched, but still substantially unburnt. ‘Well, maybe not pleasant, Miss Groot.’
Certainly not pleasant; because there were still things he couldn’t work out, in that relationship, now that her cover was off. But they would have to wait until he had better and sharper weapons to hand. ‘But a surprise—I must admit that—’ Simultaneously, he felt the weight of the weapon in his hand and saw her eyes fix on it. ‘I was expecting someone else… I’m not quite sure who, to be honest… But not you, Miss Groot.’ He slid the .38 back into its holster, settling it comfortably with elaborate unconcern under his own breast as though to emphasize that he could see very clearly that she carried no such weapon under hers. ‘Not you, Miss Groot.’
Then he looked round the room. Its three other doors were all ajar, but he somehow felt that they concealed no back-up, either CIA or KGB. And there was really very little point in confirming his instinct, anyway.
Price, Anthony - For the Good of the State So he came back to her, with the best smile he could manage. ‘Or, as you would say, Miss Groot… “I sure as hell took him—you should have seen his face when he came in”.’ As he looked at her, and saw a muscle twitch on her cheek, he had to force himself to believe that the smile wasn’t hurting her. Because, whatever else she was, she was damn good at her job, he must believe. ‘Okay. So you took me, Miss Groot. So what next?’
She reached across herself to adjust the too-revealing lace. ‘It’s no good my saying that you’re one-hundred-per-cent wrong, I guess
—?’
No!
‘Not the slightest good, my dear.’ What made it worse—or worst—
was that he had never been taken like this before. ‘You take me once… that’s because you’re good at your job. But you take me twice… then that’s because I’m stupid. So please don’t insult me by pulling the other one—okay?’
She considered that for all of half a minute before replying. Then she felt under her pillow and threw a little automatic pistol on the green brocade. ‘Okay, Tom. So you put that somewhere on your side, and come to bed—okay?’
It was one of the new .22s he’d heard about, but had never seen. ‘I get a freebie, do I? For old times’ sake?’
Now she was beginning to hate him. And he liked that more than anything since he had caught that treacherous fragrance. ‘Okay.
You get a freebie. Just this once.’
He wanted her to hate him, he realized. ‘I’m not sure I’m in the Price, Anthony - For the Good of the State mood. Crawling round Ranulf of Caen’s ditches… and trying to look after David Audley… and driving all the way down here.’ A weird thought struck him suddenly. ‘You didn’t come down in a big black Cadillac, by any chance—? With CD plates?’
The dead look behind her eyes flickered questioningly for an instant, enabling him to turn away victoriously towards the hanging cupboard. With his back to her, he took off his coat, and then the harness of the .38, and then his tie, hanging each up in turn. Then he began to unbutton his shirt.
‘Did you?’ The quite appalling truth was that he was in the mood, in spite of everything: he wanted her with an anger and a self-loathing which ought to have revolted him but didn’t. ‘A black Cadillac?’ He moved slightly so that he could see her in one of the dressing-table mirrors. She was still on that same elbow, but was busy adjusting one shoulder-strap as though to make herself hallways decent, as she had never thought to do before. ‘Was that yours?’
She looked up suddenly, straight into the mirror. ‘Uh-huh.’
Strangers in the mirror, thought Tom. Last night we were lovers, but now we’re worse than enemies, we’re strangers. He moved again, staring at himself. And here’s another stranger, too!
He sat down on the dressing-table stool and began to take off his shoes, half-fearful that he might find cloven-hooves in them, with the toe-caps filled with devil’s oakum, as in the old Polish fairy-tale Mamusia had told him years ago. ‘But it isn’t in the hotel car park, is it?’
Price, Anthony - For the Good of the State
‘They gave me a Metro, Tom.’
They? ‘Yes. I suppose a Caddy would have been a bit obvious, at that.’ Now he was down to his trousers. But, very strangely, the brutal stranger inside him was embarrassed, as the old Tom had never been—just as the stranger on the bed had been embarrassed about her slipped shoulder-strap.
‘You’ve been checking out the place, then?’
It was a curiously innocent question, delivered in a voice which had suddenly become curiously shaky, ‘Not well enough, apparently.’ There had been a Metro in the car park: a silver MG
Metro, B-registered. But there had been no Wilhemina Groot in the hotel register to match it, of course.
‘W-what took you… so long?’
He remembered his pyjamas—the pyjamas he hadn’t worn last night. Mamusia’s Christmas-tree present from last year, still in their festive wrapper: Christian Dior, Midnight Blue, finest silk.
They were the natural partners of the thing the blonde stranger on the rugger pitch was wearing. And they were in his case in the dressing-room. ‘I was checking the place out—not well enough—’
He threw the words over his shoulder as he found Mamusia’s unopened present ‘ —I just told you.’
They? he thought again. The odds said CIA, but he couldn’t take that for granted. All he knew was what Audley had already concluded, that too many people already knew too much.
‘I mean—’ She threw the words back at him, out of the bedroom
‘—what took you so long to the hotel, Tom honey?’
Price, Anthony - For the Good of the State He ripped the wrapper savagely—ridiculous things—
(‘They’re lovely, Mamusia dear. But you know I don’t wear pyjamas.’)
(‘But you should have them nevertheless, my darling. Whenever you go away… if there is a fire. Or a husband knocking on your door. Or… on your wedding night, my darling… there is a moment of delicacy—’)
“There was a pile-up on the motorway, just before the Taunton intersection, Miss Groot.‘ Mamusia cherished a long love-hate relationship with the idea of her only son’s hypothetical marriage: she didn’t want to be a mother-in-law, but she wanted a daughter-in-law to dress and dominate; and she didn’t want to be a grandmother, but she dearly wanted a grandchild to mould, having failed with Tom himself. ’We were held up for an hour or more.‘